By Rachel Galvin
As the Cuban Missle crisis ramps up, Grenville Wynne, an unassuming English salesman played by Bernadict Cumberbatch, has been recruited by MI6 and a beautiful CIA operative (Rachel Brosnahan,known for playing Midge in “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”) to get into the spy game. His mission is to do business as usual but over in Russia. While there, he is to meet up with Oleg Penkovsky (Merab Ninidze), who will surreptiously slip him some top secret documents that he is to transport back to England. The goal is for England and the U.S. to get a better grip on Kruschev’s plans before the crisis reaches a breaking point. The film is filled with quiet intrigue. The acting from the leading men showcases the fear both men must have felt but they keep it internal, except when it explodes at the end for Cumberbatch, who deserves great praise for going all out in this performance (something not unexpected from this accomplished actor). The movie is beautifully filmed; the locations, lighting, music, etc. adding much to exemplify the mood in this period piece. Originally, it was released at Sundance in 2020 under the name “Ironbark” and had an August 28 release date, which was obviously pushed forward due to COVID-19. The film was released on March 19 under “The Courier.” This is a true story. These two gentlemen ended up changing the world and they brought more than 5000 such documents out of the USSR. Now, there is a hotline set up between the U.S. and Russia so that, hopefully, a crisis such as this will never happen again.